Syria hints it will agree to UN quiz

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FACING the threat of international sanctions, Syria says it
could allow intelligence officials suspected in the assassination
of a former Lebanese prime minister to be questioned overseas by UN
investigators.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has moved to defuse growing
international pressure on his regime after the stinging UN report
that implicated Damascus in the assassination of Rafiq Hariri.

Mr Assad has yet to comment on the report but the crisis has
become the biggest test of his five-year rule.

Since the report was released on Thursday night, Syrian
officials have issued a stream of statements condemning it as
designed to undermine the Syrian regime.

Mr Hariri's son, Saad, who heads the largest anti-Syrian bloc in
Lebanon's Parliament, repeated his faction's call for an
international tribunal to try suspects in his father's killing.

"Reaching justice presents the Arab and international community
with additional responsibilities that prompt us to urge them to
continue all aspects of the investigation in the crime and refer it
to an international court," he said from his home in Saudi
Arabia.

At a news conference in Damascus on Saturday, Riad Daoudi, the
counsel to the Syrian Foreign Minister, said that the country could
allow witnesses to be interviewed overseas by the UN investigation
team  a key demand as it pursues its inquiries.

Mr Daoudi repeated Syrian accusations of political bias and a
lack of hard evidence in the report. But he also said that Syria
"might agree" to any request for overseas interviews.

"We'll co-operate but we'll wait to see the limits and elements
of this co-operation," Mr Daoudi said.

The UN report by German prosecutor Detlev Mehlis stopped short
of directly blaming Mr Assad for the assassination. But it
contended that the February 14 killing of Mr Hariri and 22 others
could not have happened without the approval of top Syrian
officials and Lebanese intelligence counterparts.

The report names individuals from a cross-section of the Syrian
Government  civilian and military officials, politicians and
intelligence figures.

It cited one witness as implicating Mr Assad's powerful
brother-in-law, Asef Shawkat, a member of the Government's inner
circle.

The US and France are expected to put resolutions critical of
Syria before the UN Security Council tomorrow.